


the familiar color of you

by spacejam72



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alcohol Abuse, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Blood, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fear, Fighting, Healing, Heavy Angst, Hurt Naruto, Hurt sasuke, Intimacy, M/M, Mental Instability, Mentions of Itachi, Mutual Pining, PTSD, Panic Attacks, Repressed Emotions, Romantic Tension, Sasuke has nightmares, Self-Loathing, Self-Medication, Some Fluff, Telepathic Bond, boys in love but its complicated, making out while crying, naruto taking care of sasuke, set post-valley of the end but its different, some violence but non-graphic, sun and moon references, tsukuyomi side-effects
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-07
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2020-02-27 12:53:56
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 12,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18739444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacejam72/pseuds/spacejam72
Summary: Naruto had known from the moment they’d returned to Konoha that something was wrong. He could sense it in the way Sasuke moved. In the way he breathed... as if there was something dark and impossibly heavy sitting where his lungs should be. As if their final battle had taken all the living out of Sasuke and replaced it with something else, something half-full, something unbearable that demanded to be felt.





	1. tempest in the dark

Red. All Sasuke can see is red. 

Thick, nauseating red... splattered across the floor and walls like spilled paint across a canvas. Electric, malevolent red, pouring through the windows; bathing everything it can touch in fluorescent ultraviolence. The color seeks to consume him, searing itself in Sasuke’s mind like a branding iron that refuses to let him forget. It always starts out this way. The stillness, the silence. The palpable kind of fear you can taste. 

Time seems to move in slow motion, as if he’s suspended outside himself, unable to intervene as every nerve in his body begs for him to move...to do something, anything. Sasuke watches, paralyzed, as the sickening red runs down the silver blade, dripping down to meet tatami matted floors and mix with the ocean of color already stained there. His eyes are wide in terror as he trembles, unable to properly convey out loud the pain that rips him apart from the inside out. The bodies of his father and mother are sickly warm, but still... still, as the red flows and flows.

The room is silent until it isn’t. 

Sasuke wills his legs to move in his shock, stumbling forward until his knees give out beneath him, hitting the red-stained mat below. His hands shake, covered in hot, foreign blood and red neon that dances in abstract hued patterns over his skin. He lets out a strangled scream of anguish. He can’t hear the sound but he can feel it as it tears itself free from his throat. All he can see and feel is the red... _feel_ as it threatens to devour him. He sobs, and his whole body heaves with the weight of his grief, his hatred, his fear…

Sasuke’s wet eyes travel up the sharpness of the dripping blade, up to that hand that grips it...to the face that haunts his mind in the most agonizing of ways. _Itachi._ His face is stone-cold, eyes lit with the same red that stains the floor. His teeth are bared in a cruel, false smile. Unfeeling. Sadistic.

No matter how many times Sasuke screamed...no matter how many times he begged...the outcome would be no different. This memory would continue to play on repeat as if it were the first time all over again. The tsukuyomi inverts, the color draining from his surroundings as he hears the sickening slash of the blade through flesh all over again. Red. So much red. Again and again and again.

Sasuke screams until he can’t bare it any longer, the choked sound becoming smaller as he sobs. The scene replays hundreds of times, the image of Itachi just fueling his grief. This pain is inescapable --devastating-- each night his mind spiraling further into madness all over again. 

He wasn’t strong enough then to stop it. He wasn’t strong enough now to make the village repent for what Itachi was forced to do. He deserves this pain. This dark, sick pain that demanded to be felt. He would never be free of it. Never--

_“Sasuke.”_

The familiar voice cuts through Sasuke’s mind, shattering the integrity of the nightmare instantly. The blade and the electric red melt into one, swirling and blending in dizzying frenzies until they fade away altogether. Itachi’s eyes are the last to go, and with them is replaced with blue... _familiar_ blues, like a drop of ink in otherwise empty space, drained of all its color.

_“Sasuke.”_

Sasuke jerks awake in his bed, trembling frantically and drenched in a cold sweat. He struggles to breathe, heaving as though his lungs were filled with water, drowning under the weighted manifestation of his own grief. The pain in his chest is sharp, each short, hissed breath causing him to hyperventilate more as images of that night flood his mind. His throat is scratchy, leading him to believe he’s been screaming in his sleep again. 

Sasuke can feel the stomach acid rising up into his throat, and he has to swallow harshly to keep it all down. His head is still spinning, eyes glossy with delirium and shed tears he refuses to acknowledge. He swipes at the wetness on his cheeks angrily, self-loathing igniting within him as quickly as a wildfire burns. His hands tremble and sweat, heart beating loudly in his ears as realization sets in. 

It happened again. God damnit, it happened _again._

It’s still dark out, but the last of the moon’s soft blue light filters in through his bedside window, contrasting the twisted expression etched on Sasuke’s face. His eyes dart briefly towards the source of the light, desperate to escape the phantom red that permeates his vision. He follows the pearls of water dancing over the surface of his window, partially obscuring his view of the metropolitan center of Konoha. _It’s raining,_ Sasuke registers placidly, his hand still shaking as he wipes the midnight black hair that sticks to his forehead out of his face.

He blinks the distortion of his vision away, carefully pacing his inhales and exhales to the sound of foggy showers outside, a welcome distraction from the hell ravaging his brain. Slowly, his eyes begin to focus on the sight of his dimly lit apartment instead of blood-splattered floors, the ones that haunt his dreams every night and chase sleep away. His breathing finally steadies, but the beating in his chest is persistent. 

It’s quiet, for a brief moment.

_“Oi, Sasuke...are you okay?”_ The voice from before is back, audibly groggy and overflowing with nervous concern as it echoes in Sasuke’s head for only him to hear. That voice...Oh. _Oh._

_“Get out of my head, Naruto.”_ Sasuke snaps back defensively, quickly recognizing the voice even in his shaken state. The remnants of his nightmare abandon him like a rising fog, and Sasuke is left with the sobering image of reality. Him, alone, in his bed. Naruto, his voice still raspy from sleep, in his head. Sasuke quietly sucks in air through his teeth as the situation registers all at once. _Shit._

_“I can’t exactly help it, you know.”_ Naruto remarks, uncharacteristically quiet.

The bond. His nightmare had opened their bonded connection without him realizing. Sasuke sighs internally in exhaustion and steadily building agitation. 

He knew this wasn’t something either of them could control, not really anyway. But as the frequency of Sasuke’s nightmares increased, so did these... _telepathic accidents._ They had both agreed to keep the connection closed-- mostly for Sasuke’s sake-- but thoughts... strong emotions... sometimes they slipped through the cracks, like an interrupted stream of two-way consciousness that ebbed and flowed between them. 

He didn’t fully understand it himself, only that it was yet another inevitable consequence of their entwined fates. Destined for one another by some strange twist of preordained circumstance. However lately, the bond served no such purpose besides making everything a hell of a lot harder.

_“I could feel you...You were in pain.”_ Naruto notes softly, as if the words stung him as he spoke them.

Sasuke doesn’t dispute that fact. He notices the way Naruto’s voice catches in his throat as though there were a lump there, and the sadness swallowing every syllable as the blonde’s words linger in his mind...but he doesn’t say anything about that either. 

It was easier this way, if he didn’t. 

Instead, he allows the connection to open ever-so-slightly, just enough that he could easily sense him now. _Naruto._ The gentle buzz of the blonde’s consciousness is now ever-present in the background of his mind, familiar and warm and distinctly _him._

The feeling is a strange comfort to Sasuke, as if all this time he’d been missing a part of himself as essential as the air he breathes or the blood pumping through his veins but _more._ It was the lost piece of his soul he unconsciously longed for... the first break of sunshine after the darkness of a tempest, the sun to his moon.

And as long as he could feel him, even for just one fleeting moment through a fickle bond, Sasuke’s heart was at peace. The dull hum of the other boy’s presence soothes him without even trying. He would never admit it out loud of course, but it was true. The feeling is subtle. Intimate… like it was made for him to feel and for him alone. Sasuke's eyes trace the crescent moon imprinted on his left palm. Perhaps that was true.

It had been a long time --months at least-- since Sasuke allowed himself to sense Naruto, and now that he had, he welcomed it, drinking it up intoxicatingly, as if he was an addict desperately craving a fix of dopamine. But the more he was perceptive to it, the more he could feel the sadness underneath all of his golden warmth, hidden away and pushed down so deeply in attempts to make it go away entirely. He knew the feeling well. 

Sasuke bites his lip in half-guilt, snapping himself from his self-indulgent pining as the images of that night flash menacingly his mind once more. Worry twists mercilessly in his gut, as another realization occurs to him, causing him to wince sharply. _The nightmare._ How much of the tsukuyomi had Naruto felt through the bond? He wasn’t sure he could bare to know.

A pensive frown etches itself over Sasuke’s features. He squeezes his eyes shut, blocking out the light from the moon’s glow that settles over his skin and midnight hair in watercolor blues. 

It wasn’t fair to him, Sasuke knew that. This was his burden to carry, not Naruto’s. His penance to pay. His curse. Naruto never did anything but try to save people, even when he shouldn’t. Even when they didn’t deserve saving. 

Sasuke grimaces. It wasn’t fair. It just wasn’t.

_“Naruto...”_ he starts, not quite knowing how to formulate his thoughts or what to say.

_“Mm...Sasuke? What is it?”_ Naruto hums back with groggy surprise, as if he hadn’t expected a response back.

Sasuke hesitates, dark eyes cast downward as he stares at his bruised knuckles, still tangled in the midnight blue bed-sheets. He can feel the blonde’s nervous energy buzzing quietly through the bond as he waits for an answer, but Sasuke remains silent. He had never been any good at expressing his feelings, especially when it came to Naruto. If he had been, maybe it would have saved them all those years of pain and suffering. _Maybe._

Sasuke wouldn’t tell him about the nightmare. 

He wouldn’t tell him about all the nights he spent screaming in anguish, thrashing around in the dark, nails digging into the sheets because it all felt so real… the nights when even as he wakes, he can’t blink the delusion away like smoke in his eyes. Instead it remains, an unseen horror with its red gaze fixed on him as if he’s a wounded animal for hunting. He wouldn’t tell him about how the nightmares were the only thing he had left that connected him to Itachi, or how sometimes it made him so sick he wanted to leave all over again.

He wouldn’t tell him about how when the nights were long and filled with terror, all Sasuke can bring himself to want is Naruto. For the image of his eyes...deeply blue and tender, filled to the brim with distinctly _Naruto_ disposition. For the warmth that just his presence could bring. For his light, airy laugh that reminded Sasuke of home more than anything else. Those were the only things he could think of to chase away the demons that devoured him when he was alone. 

He wouldn’t tell Naruto any of this, no matter how much he longed for the release from keeping it all in, repressed and aching in his chest. The same pain he felt all those years away, consumed by the darkness. He wouldn’t, because he knew better than anyone what would happen when he did. Naruto would try his hardest to fix him. That’s what he does...he fixes people, no matter how messed up they are. No matter how much they don’t deserve it.

And he had burdened his heart enough. 

_“Ah, nothing. Just...sorry for waking you.”_ Sasuke resigns placidly, his tone even as his eyes wander back to the moonlit window and over the distorted silhouette of Konoha’s cityscape. 

_“You didn’t!”_ Naruto answers back defensively.

Sasuke arches a slender eyebrow. He didn’t have to use the bond to know that wasn’t true. 

_“You’re lying.”_ Sasuke notes, a bemused lilt easing into his voice.

_“Oi! Don’t read my mind, bastard.”_

Sasuke cracks an imperceptible smile to himself. 

_“I didn’t have to. You’re a bad liar...usuratonkachi.”_

Naruto’s breath hitches in his throat at the sound of that familiar nickname. Sasuke hadn’t used it in a while. Not since that day at the valley. Just thinking about it made the ache in Sasuke’s chest deepen. 

Naruto recovers quickly, letting out a gentle, breathy laugh that sends a shiver down Sasuke’s spine and makes his knees weak. He’s lucky the connection is only slightly open on his end, or his pathetic reactions would’ve been outed to the blonde by now.

The night lulls into neutral silence for a few moments. Sasuke sinks back down into his bed. Normally he wished for silence, generally annoyed with the pointlessness of polite chatter. But not now. The brief distraction of Naruto’s presence and the raspy, sleep drunk sound of his voice in his head was enough to calm Sasuke down at least for a little while. 

However now, in the quiet, he can feel it creeping in again, as if the shadows of his room expanded and deepened in attempts to swallow him up into darkness again. Sasuke’s breathing quickens. His hands begin to shake. _Not again._

Naruto’s voice is back, tone dripping in sombre melancholy.

_“Do you...wanna talk about it?”_

_“No.”_ Sasuke says quickly, the sound coming out more aggressive than he’d meant. 

Self-loathing flares up within him immediately, digging at him like the tip of a serrated blade pressed to his gut. Sasuke takes a shaky breath, trying again, this time more composed, even though the storm in his brain was already raging, bringing him back to where he started. Spiraling, spinning, with no grounding for his feet to meet the world beneath him. He makes no effort to keep these feelings to himself, he doesn’t even register it as the connection opens on his end in his panic. Stomach acid rises into his throat once more and his mouth goes dry. 

_“No, I don’t want to talk about it.”_ He says, monotone, distant. _“I can’t.”_

Red. 

_“Sasuke-”_

So much red. 

It covers his hands. He’s swimming in it. He can taste it in the air, the way it sticks thickly to everything it touches. Vile, malevolent _red._

Sasuke’s eyes stare wide ahead, jaw slack, hypnotized by an invisible horror unfolding in front of him. The flash of sharp silver...the hand that grips it...the sickening slash. Over and over again.

_“Sasuke please-”_

Sasuke spills the contents of his stomach on his bedroom floor. He barely registers it, not until after, when he can feel it burning his throat and stinging his eyes. He retches, desperate to get the images overflowing him out of his head. He’d do anything to make it stop.

_“It hurts.”_ He didn’t mean for that to come out. 

_“I know. I know it hurts. Let me help you.”_ Naruto agonizes, pleading with him. He sounds as if he’s crying or close to it.

He’s hurting him. God, he’s hurting him again. All he fucking does is hurt him. 

_“No. No. Leave me alone.”_ Sasuke chokes out. 

He rises from his knees shakily, stumbling towards the kitchen, away from the smell of his own vomit. Each step brings a new memory with it. He’s running now...running through the streets of the Uchiha living quarters. The moon is full, much like tonight. He can see the blurred bodies as he runs, the red that decorates the walls, his screams stark against the quiet of the night. 

He’s running away again. Like he always does. 

_“I can’t...not anymore. Not now that I finally have you back. I’m coming over, okay?”_ Naruto declares more than asks, fierce determination and emotion burning through his voice, crackling through the bond like lightning in the Spring.

_“No you’re not.”_ Sasuke replies, monotone still, his breathing uneven as he reaches for an all-too-familiar bottle of sake hidden in his top cabinet. His hand shakes as he grips it. 

_“Yes. I am.”_

Sasuke growls, irrational anger quickly overtaking him as he twists the cap, cocking the trigger before he pulls it. Its staunch golden contents burn as it goes down his throat. He takes a swig, twice, three times, four. He promised he would stop. Five. But it was the only thing that suppressed the nightmares enough for him to sleep. Six. He needed to forget.

_“The hell you are. I’ll keep the door locked.”_

_“Then I’ll break the fucking door down, Sasuke!”_ Naruto cries out in desperation, frustration erupting from him uncontrollably.

_“Don’t you get it?! I don’t want your help. I don’t want you, Naruto!”_ Sasuke snarls.

Naruto is quiet. Everything is quiet now. 

Sasuke stills, his breathing slowing as the delusion frees him finally. He lowers the bottle until he can hear the clink against the countertop. _Fuck._

He didn’t mean it. He really didn’t. But that didn’t matter. 

Sasuke can feel how hurt Naruto is. It’s profound and ugly and raw. He tries to hide it, but it’s identical to the pain that dwells in his own chest. He swallows down the lump forming in his throat as his eyes begin to water. 

_“Don’t shut me out.”_ Naruto’s voice is so small, so tired. _“Please.”_

He hadn’t noticed the connection was closing until now, but he urges it to disappear completely, desperate for the guilt that pierces him to go away. 

He needed to be alone. He needed to drink and let his self-loathing devour him until there was nothing left.

He can’t feel Naruto anymore, the soft buzz from before was gone, leaving him empty, incomplete.

_“Don’t-”_

Somehow this hurts more than any nightmare could.

_“I’m sorry for waking you.”_ Sasuke says finally, echoing his words from earlier, as the connection’s flow stops altogether.

Sasuke allows himself to sink to the floor of his kitchen, dragging the bottle of sake down with him. He drinks himself into oblivion, chasing away the demons and the night terrors that slither in seeking shelter in his mind. He drinks until the pain in his chest lessons, his guilt and anger weighing him down impossibly to the earth... until it lightens neutrally, lifting like a raven’s feather in the wind. Until he forgets.

He drinks until the name Itachi becomes unrecognizable to him.

The walls of his kitchen begin to blend together and darken. He can no longer form coherent sentences. His mind swims disorientedly, searching for anything to ground him so he doesn’t disappear altogether. 

Deeply blue eyes gaze back at him in the dark. His subconscious locks onto their familiar disposition, drinking in the color as if it was the last thing he’d see until everything else fades to black. 

_I'm sorry. For everything._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> greetings! thanks so much for reading, I appreciate it! <3333  
> so this fic is essentially my take on revisualizing Sasuke's recovery/ what would have happened if things were different and Sasuke had stayed in Konoha instead of leaving. with a dash of angst, hurt/comfort, and telepathic bonds bc I'm a sucker for allll of that.  
> to contextualize a bit, as mentioned in the tags, this fic is working off the basis that the final battle happened a little differently (for example: they didn't lose their arms/matching sun and moon tattoos bc I loved those damn things) and more importantly that Sasuke wasn't healed immediately afterwards.   
> it's also working off the idea that after the tsukuyomi Sasuke was put under in part 1 (where he had to watch his family's murder over and over again) he's developed a few involuntary side effects, further complicating the already really complicated relationship he had with Itachi.  
> and of course, there will be lots of narusasu and lots of healing needed on both of their parts (Naruto has his own unresolved issues). so buckle up, grab your tissues, because this shit is gonna HURT. just kidding........ UNLESS-  
> hehe. comments and kudos are always appreciated, if you'd like to follow me on social media my twitter @ is kohoeha <3


	2. here comes the sun

Soft golden light settles impartially over everything it can touch-- still-- like the morning dew that pearls on the petals of flowers that grow on Konoha’s hillside in the spring. It spills through swaying curtains, lifted by a warm, temperate breeze, scattering over worn wooden floors, empty instant ramen cups, and messy bed sheets. Tender sunlight kisses blonde eyelashes and parted lips as the sleeping form tangled in blankets rises and falls, breathing deeply. 

This morning is quiet and it’s blue. 

Blue, like the color of the sky after a traceless storm in the night. Blue, like the warped reflection of the moon on raging tides. Blue... like the hidden feeling--the one that’s been there all along-- twisting deeply in Naruto’s chest the moment he begins to stir. 

Calloused fingertips twitch reflexively, unconsciously longing for something just beyond their reach. For something...rather, _someone_ that had been gone for so long it had become a motion of habit to miss it. 

It had seemed like years since Naruto slept well, and last night was no exception. 

He was used to the tossing and turning by now-- he had to be-- but loneliness would always be a fresh wound, one that brewed and festered as the sky grew dark and melted into muted shades of black. 

Through the day, he could distract himself enough from feeling it, he could even convince himself he had everything he could ever need, that he wasn’t angry and bitter underneath it all, but he knew better. Each night he would still walk home to an empty apartment, one where he would lay awake for hours before sleep would claim him, the silence and the sadness a tangible reminder of what he would forever long for but never have. 

The blanketed form covered in gold stirs once more, rolling over on its side and blinking awake, blue eyes tinged red underneath fluttering blonde eyelashes. Memories of the previous night flood back in waves, the feelings and words conducted through the bond coming back abstract and muddy, as if it was just the remnants of a nightmare he couldn’t wake from and not his star-crossed reality.

Naruto lets out a heavy breath, twisting his fingers in the material of his shirt over his heart before curling in on himself under the light of the sun.

_Sasuke._

He doesn’t have to tap into the connection to know. 

He can feel the ache of Sasuke’s absence down to his bones the moment he wakes. It’s more than just emotional, more than just a bond, or something natural experienced by friends or lovers. It transcended codependency. 

His soul and his body physically longed for the raven-haired boy, as if Sasuke was air to breathe and water to drink. As if there was some invisible entity, a gravitational force that pulled him into Sasuke’s orbit whether he consciously recognized it or not. 

It hurts. It always does when Sasuke shuts him out. 

He understood more than anybody how intensely Sasuke could _feel_ , how intensely he could hurt without telling anyone. All Naruto wanted was to lessen his pain in any way he could, to make it just a fraction better even though that seemed impossible. 

Naruto would bear the burden of Sasuke’s agony without hesitation if it meant saving him from feeling it even a little bit. 

And he didn’t have to question why that was. He knew. He always has deep down.

Naruto’s knuckles relax, releasing the material of his sleep shirt. He lets his hand fall back to the tangled sheets, studying the simple pattern on his right palm absently, letting the sunlight warm his skin as he traces its shape with his index finger. 

_I don’t want you,_ that’s what he said. _I don’t want you._

Naruto knew he didn’t mean it, yet he still repeated those words like a prayer in his head hundreds of times before he could sleep. 

Sasuke’s words always stung deeper than any wound could.

He found it hard enough to sleep knowing Sasuke was suffering alone mere minutes away, but their conversation that night hadn’t helped either. Naruto knew he shouldn’t have pushed him so hard, knew he shouldn’t have lost his temper like he did. He just couldn’t help it. 

After all, this wasn’t the first time Sasuke had woken Naruto with one of his nightmares. 

The episodes always start out the same. They’re sudden. Disorienting. 

One moment Naruto’s sleeping and the next he’s gasping awake, suffocated by terror conveyed through the bond, of pain that isn’t his own but feels just as real, just as raw as if it were. 

Usually all he can grasp is just flashes of what Sasuke can see and feel: colors, thoughts, and images from their connection overwhelming his system all at once. It always robs Naruto’s breath from his lungs when Sasuke lets him in, even if it was accidentally in his sleep. 

His knees falter as if they had lost all ability to stand on their own. It’s painfully intimate, hypersensitive. And the nightmares make it unbearable.

Naruto often cries from the intensity of it all, sometimes more than Sasuke himself. He can’t help it. He hates feeling Sasuke in pain, especially when he won’t let him even try to make it any better. 

All he can think to do in the midst of the storm is to call out for him, to wait until the waves of agony calm into warm currents as he attempts to talk him down off a ledge. Sometimes it works, but most of the time it doesn’t. 

And when it’s bad...so bad he can’t stand it anymore, Sasuke drinks.

He drinks until he falls apart. 

Naruto’s face turns tense at that thought, remembering how undone the raven-haired man looked lying in that hospital bed all those months ago. 

He recalls the feeling of Sakura taking his hand in her own and squeezing, silent emotion hanging in the air between them as they watched Sasuke’s chest rise and fall. Words weren’t needed then. There was nothing Naruto could say to make the fear in her eyes go away, although he desperately wished there was. 

There wasn’t because Naruto knew an identical fear lingered in his own. The kind of fear that made it hard to speak without choking, hard to look at Sasuke’s dark circles and bruises marring his body without his eyes watering, hard to breathe in that quiet hospital room that smelled of cleaning products and blood and not want to scream and tear at the walls until this feeling would go away. 

Naruto had only been able to see him conscious and aware for a few moments before Sasuke sent him away. 

_“I don’t want him to see me like this”_ is what he had quietly said to Sakura, his voice coming out strained and devoid of any emotion as though he had lost all effort to make sound. 

He couldn’t even look at Naruto. 

Sakura had no choice but to ask him to go, although it killed her to do so. And he did. 

Naruto didn’t want to leave him. He would have stayed. He would have stayed for as long as Sasuke needed. He would have done anything. 

But Sasuke _didn’t want him._

Naruto still sat in the hospital lobby every day until he was released. He would pace and pace, waiting until Sakura was done with her shift to ambush her about Sasuke’s recovery, bombarding her with questions all at once, which would usually result in a quick punch to the arm that was a little too strong for his liking, and then the answers he was prying for.  
When Sasuke was released, he was very quiet, even more-so than usual. 

They never talked about it. 

Naruto had known from the moment they’d returned to Konoha that something was wrong. He could sense it in the way Sasuke moved. In the way he breathed, as if there was something dark and impossibly heavy sitting where his lungs should be. As if their final battle had taken all the living out of Sasuke and replaced it with something else, something half-full, something unbearable that demanded to be felt. 

Later Granny Tsunade described it as a sickness of sorts. 

A sickness that couldn’t be treated with medicine or mere intervention. A sickness that plagued Sasuke’s brain and ate at him for years after Itachi put him under that tsukuyomi. A sickness that may never go away, but instead fester until it consumes him whole. Until there’s simply nothing left.

Naruto wouldn’t let that happen. He didn't care what he had to do. Nothing would take Sasuke from him again. _Nothing._

An assertive knock at his apartment door jerks Naruto from his thoughts. Blue eyes widen in curiosity as he turns towards the sound. 

He wasn’t expecting anyone, let alone at this time, but that wasn’t exactly unusual. 

Shikamaru tended to drop by whenever he felt like it. Sai and Sakura regularly showed up unannounced, cup ramen and board games in tow for their weekly sleepovers. It was a bit early for that, though.  
Sasuke was a rare occurrence, usually opting for his bedroom window between the hours of 4am and 6, although that hasn’t happened in a while. Kiba, Choji, and Lee were unpredictable, always showing up at his door at the strangest but most fitting of times for impromptu sparring matches, competitions over bar-be-que, or simply for company. 

Just the thought of his friends coming to visit him always made him a bit giddy, heart beating fast in his chest and a grin twitching at his lips instantly. It made the ache of loneliness that dwells inside him somehow lighter than before, more bearable when the nights were long, when everything else was wrong. He would never get tired of it. 

The knocking continues, knuckles rapping incessantly against wood. Bedsheets rustle briefly, and slippered feet eagerly meet the ground.

“Coming, just a second-!” Naruto calls, making his way from his bed to the door, almost tripping over his own two feet doing so. 

He kicks a couple empty ramen cups across the ground, along with some laundry, swinging the door open with a little too much force.

“Sakura?” Naruto asks, owlish eyed, taking in the sight of his pink-haired best friend standing with her hand on her hip, wrinkling the material of her lab coat. Her eyebrows are knitted together pensively, bottom lip pushed out slightly. 

“Took you long enough to answer.” Sakura complains, with a hint of playfulness in her voice. 

“Sorry, sorry, I was sleeping in.” Naruto grins sheepishly, scratching the back of his head as he moves aside to let her in. 

But instead Sakura hesitates in front of him, her eyes narrowing as she catches his face in her hand firmly, studying him. Naruto makes a noise of protest, and she scrunches his face together under her fingertips like a scolding mother, turning his face to the side and humming in disapproval at the dark circles under his eyes.

“Sleeping, huh? You look like a wreck.” She challenges bluntly, a concerned edge slipping into her voice. 

Naruto laughs nervously as she releases him. 

“Trying to, anyways.” He amends.

Sakura eyes him up and down skeptically.

“What happened? Did you and Sasuke get into a fight?”

Naruto avoids her gaze as the door shuts behind them. Sakura was painfully perceptive as always. 

Fussy, determined, and painfully stubborn. He chuckles mentally to himself. And god, did he love her for it. Perhaps not the kind of love he once thought it was, but love all the less. 

Just her presence was calming for Naruto, a welcome distraction from this ache that had claimed his heart and refused to let go. He didn’t want her to fuss over him and Sasuke more than she already had, but he supposed that was inevitable. Sakura always did have a knack for worrying when it came to them.

“No, no, of course not. Everything’s fine.” he lied, “You worry too much Sakura-”

“You’re a bad liar.” Sakura remarks bluntly. _Yeah, he’s been told._

Naruto sighs, falling back onto the messy blanketed lump that was his bed. 

“It was worth a try.” He laughs, “I can never pull one over on you, huh?”

“Of course not. You should know that by now.” She griped, laying back on his bed next to him, wrinkling her lab coat as she did. 

They ended up like this a lot... late-nights staring at the ceiling, eating junk food, laughing while reminiscing over missions they’d been on as genin... back before things weren’t so complicated, when Sasuke would still smile with them and the ache in Naruto’s chest suddenly felt warm, very warm... Crying over the things they’d seen and the things they’d lost together after all this time. 

They’d spent more time on the latter than he’d liked, but it was more bearable together than it was alone. Sakura understood. She always did without him needing to say anything.

“It’s bad again Sakura. I can feel it,” Naruto says quietly. “And he won’t let me help him.”

Sakura turns her head, expression tired and sad under the gold light of the sun. 

She looks exhausted.

“How bad?” She asks quietly..

Naruto is silent for a moment, remembering the rush of nausea and hatred, and pure, paralyzing fear he’d felt through the bond the night before. The way he could feel Sasuke’s soul agonizing to make the pain stop. 

Naruto bites his lip, closing his eyes.

“Worse than before.”

Sakura blinks at him, then frowns, thinking to herself for a moment. 

“Naruto…” 

“What is it?” He turns toward her, frowning and instantly alarmed by her tone.

“Have you seen him today? Or heard from him at all?”

Naruto frowns. 

“No, not since last n-...why? What’s going on?”

Sakura pushes herself up on her elbows, her face tense. 

“Sasuke told me he’d stop by the hospital this morning after his Anbu patrol shift to help with my genin team… but he never showed. I didn’t think much of it then, but...”

Sakura’s jade eyes meet Naruto’s blues with a silent implication. 

Worry flares through Naruto’s body like wildfire in his blood... hot, uncomfortable, suffocating. His mind goes blank, searching through the bond and nothing else. Searching for any traces of Sasuke…feelings, thoughts, images...

Nothing. He was shut out. 

Naruto’s feet start moving before his mind can catch up. 

“I’ll find him,” He tells Sakura, already yanking some clothes on haphazardly. “We won’t lose him again, I promise.” His voice sounded sure, more sure than he felt inside. 

“Naruto...” 

Sasuke would be okay. He had to be. He had to be because Naruto didn’t know what he would do if he wasn’t. He didn’t care what he had to do. 

Naruto would crawl through fire, nails digging into the soot, teeth bared and lungs heavy if it meant saving Sasuke.

He didn’t care how many bones he had to break, how many times he’d have to cry and let this ache rip him apart from the inside out.

_He would burn without hesitation if it meant pulling Sasuke from the ashes._

Naruto tugs on his shoes, his hand already on the knob of his apartment door.

“Naruto.” Sakura says with a bit more force. Cautious, but firm, as if she wasn’t sure how to approach what she wants to say.

Naruto doesn’t turn, but instead stops, his hand still touching the knob, fingers trembling and twitching to get closer to Sasuke, body restless with longing and concern for the raven-haired boy.

Sakura exhales heavily, drawing closer with each step.

“No more promises.”

Sakura fists a calloused hand in the fabric of the shirt on his back, but he doesn’t turn. 

“Naruto, if something happens to him... it’s not your fault.” 

“I know that.”

Sakura frowns, conflicted emotion settling into her tone as she speaks.

“Then you can’t blame yourself for it... and neither can I.” She adds softly.

Her fist tightens around black fabric.

“Do you hear me?”

Naruto is silent, blue eyes still drawn to the knob and his shaking fingers.

“I won’t watch you destroy yourself too. I can’t do it.” Sakura says lowly, her voice faltering slightly at the end. 

It’s silent for a moment before Naruto turns, brows furrowing as he takes in Sakura’s tormented expression, eyes pressed tightly closed and bottom lip slightly pushed out again. She looks young this way... strikingly similar to the timid girl from the academy all those years ago. It made his heart seize with emotion.

“Don’t worry Sakura,” Naruto says softly, biting back the sadness that threatened to escape from the lump in his throat. “Everything will be alright, just wait. It’ll be like it was again. You, me, Sasuke… we’ll be alright again.” 

Sakura just shakes her head slightly, the words falling on deaf ears. She knew he was just trying to comfort her, to remain hopeful when they were both afraid, but she couldn’t ignore the way his voice shook when he mentioned Sasuke’s name...the way he took all of this on himself, a burden that should never have been his to bear. 

Sakura was no fool. She knew why Naruto would stop at no lengths to save Sasuke. She’s known for some time now. It was there all along, just underneath everything.

It was in the way he looked at Sasuke that day at Orochimaru’s hideout… as if he had been deprived for three years of something so vital to him...something so precious it was as if Sasuke was a piece of his soul that had been ripped away and nothing would be right again until he had him back within his reach.

It was in the way Naruto crumpled to the ground, knees succumbing to gravity as he sobbed into the dirt when Sasuke left again. 

His devotion transcended want or need. Sasuke was the moon to the earth, the sun, and its stars for Naruto. 

And Sakura knew better than anybody how dangerous that could be.

“That’s not a promise. I'll make it true.” He told her, as if he believed it with every fiber of his being. As if belief alone could save Sasuke from the demons that laid claim to his soul long ago. As if it could heal everything that was broken and wrong, all the hurt they had buried down inside after losing so much.

She wanted to believe that he was right...that one day things would be as he said. 

That one day the three of them could feel light again, free from the world’s horrors and scars that marred them too deep to fix with a bandaids. 

That somehow Naruto could mend Sasuke’s heart until it became something recognizable again.

She wanted so desperately to believe him, yet didn’t trust fate enough anymore to hope for it.

Naruto was gone before she had even opened her eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> greetings! <3 as usual, thank you for reading. always warms my heart reading your kind comments on my writing.  
> hope y'all liked my take on Sakura and Naruto's friendship. I really adore her, if y'all couldn't tell.   
> it may be just a head canon on my part, but sort of how I see Naruto is someone who very much buries his feelings for the sake of others. he's very empathetic and cares a lot for his friends, so much that he would gladly sacrifice himself for someone he loves (especially someone he's so devoted to like Sasuke). but I also feel like with that, he tends to neglect himself and never really took the time to heal from how he was treated as a kid. he desperately wants acceptance and validation (which is the whole motivation behind his dream of becoming hokage). he wants to be seen. so I want to play around with that idea more, as well as this complicated relationship he has with the village, isolation, and keeping his own feelings together to always put others first.   
> just how I see it hehe. besides this little rant, Sasuke is not okay. lets see how that plays out.  
> twitter @ if u wanna yell at me: kohoeha


	3. love me tender

The wandering eyes of village people and the summer heat become ever-present and watchful on the figure moving soundlessly through narrow streets. The mid-afternoon sun casts a tangerine glow over everything it can touch… enveloping street merchants and nomads bustling through the less-traveled parts of the village in a warm haze.

Steam rises from hot dishes of rice, grilled pork and fish as vendors’ hands skillfully flip fried takoyaki and slice pickled ginger.

Brightly colored fabric and painted masks are spread out over wooden tables, perking the interest of young children who eagerly tug on their mothers’ hands to take a look. The streets of Konoha pulsate with life in the summertime, attracting strangers and natives alike with savory food, warm weather, and color…boundless color.

The caped figure moving silently through the lively street festivities takes a sharp left into a slightly less busy sidestreet, then another... walking until the sound of chattering villagers and their prying eyes dissolve into the background.

Until things become much quieter, dulling down into monochrome.

Soon the aroma of street food and the colors that adorned the streets in banners and signs fade away too, until all that’s left are bordering vacant buildings worn by the sun and rain. And soon those too fade away until all that’s left is the remnants of a complex that used to stand there.

Until all that’s left is just a memory of what used to be.

It’s been years since Sasuke last found himself walking this familiar path towards the outskirts of the village. It wasn’t as he’d remembered it.

The buildings that once bordered the path were no longer there, cracked sandstone and twisted root taking their place, along with the resounding vacancy of nothing recognizable... but even so, his body would always remember his way back to this place, no matter how hard he tried to forget.

Sasuke walks down the remnants of an old street, passing debris of what used to be the police academy... now just shards of wood and crumbled stone settled into dust.

He hesitates slightly, staring down at the rumble as if he’d find some sort of answer from the past hidden within it. But there are no answers. There’s no rationality for it.

There’s just silence... stillness where there should be motion, vacancy where there should be life.

Sasuke passes the remains of the quaint shops his mother used to frequent on weekends, and the commons the other children used to play in. He swears he can still hear the sound of their laughter...naive and innocent... echoing through the air even now.

It makes him a little sick thinking about it, his throat tightening as he stares into empty space, where the embers of old memories drift slowly in and out of focus, never to hold form nor color again.

Sasuke begins to walk once more, head dipped low as raven-dark hair partially obscures his rinnegan.

His hands shake in restrained emotion, nails digging crescents into his skin, the slight stinging pain distracting him from the fear that invades his mind with each step he takes.

_The village people don’t come near here._

They didn’t before that night, and they certainly didn’t after.

It was mere superstition that repelled them, too blinded by their own prejudice to understand that _Uchiha_ was not a dirty word to be uttered under their breath... as if they’d evoke the wrath of something damned if they spoke it directly.

Sasuke sees it in the way the villagers look at him.

It’s the same way they’ve always looked at him...with their complicit eyes, filled with malice and fear for what they don’t understand. For what they’ve never made an effort to understand.

It’s in the way mothers hide their children behind their backs when Sasuke passes by on his early morning Anbu patrols, and the way the villagers drop their voices down to a whisper...faces twisting to a sneer when they catch sight of raven-black hair and the lavender of his rinnegan. Genetic markers of a condemned clan that no longer existed.

Sasuke had learned some time ago that the cycle of hatred was hereditary.

Passed down like old songs or stories, unquestioned and absolute in their judgements. Each generation, the song repeats. Again and again and again.

There’s no way around it.

Between Konoha’s hatred and the sickness in his brain that can’t be fixed...the one that keeps him sleepless, red-eyed and drinking into oblivion...he knew it was only a matter of time until the villagers had their wish.

Sasuke didn’t have to take in the dark circles under his eyes or the nausea in his gut when he woke up on the kitchen floor that morning to know. It’s killing him, slowly.

Every night he’s lured closer to the same fate the rest of his clan… to the same fate as Itachi… so close it almost seemed pointless to resist it at all.

Destined for the same post-mortem static and monochrome, as if he never truly left this place at all.

Cautious footsteps slow to a grim stop now that they’ve reached their destination.

Everything is quiet and still.

Sasuke slowly lowers himself down to one knee, thumbing dusty rubble from what’s left of the debris between his thumb and index finger, then letting it fall again.

He takes a shaky breath, eyes filled with unspoken emotion flitting upwards to take in the familiar but foreign sight that haunts his dreams each night.

A cold fear runs up his spine.

_He shouldn’t be here._

Even still, Sasuke rises from the dirt, caught almost in a trance, feet moving automatically before his mind can catch up to them.

His eyes follow the invisible red oceans that paint the tatami mats and splintered wood numbly.

He knows where they lead. He’s seen it all before... thousands of times, the same clip played on repeat. He knows how it ends.

Sasuke’s pulse sputters out of control as he stares at the remnants of his childhood home.

This isn’t what he wanted.

He thought that coming here would lead him towards some sort of answer hidden in the past, but instead fear grips him tight, sending his mind spiraling with no release or grounding.

After all these years, the wound still bleeds the same.

He can see them now...lying there in the shadows. His mother’s eyes that once held so much life are glassy and blank as they stare back into him.

He can hear the way she used to laugh, and the way she used to dance when she was making dinner or folding laundry. He remembers the soothing chill of her hand on his forehead when he had a fever...

He remembers the way the walls looked when Itachi painted them with her blood.

The sickness that kills lures him deeper into the shadowy recesses of his mind, and every cell in his body screams at him to do something--anything--to make it all go away.

Sasuke can feel the air shift around him, right hand twitching as electricity begins to crackle and form subconsciously with the urge to fight.

His chest heaves with breath too heavy for his body to carry, lungs weighted down with lead.

_He doesn’t want to die. He doesn’t want to die. He doesn’t want to die-_

It begins in sparks first, then it blooms, bright and _blue_ , crying out like hundreds of broken-winged doves taking flight.

Blue... just like Naruto’s-

“Sasuke.”

Sasuke stills, eyes wide and unguarded as he turns, allowing the chidori and its flashing colors of light to fade out entirely.

Naruto stands ten feet away--silent-- brows furrowed in concern as he looks Sasuke over, framed by a glittering lake as the sun dances at its surface behind him.

_And suddenly...irrevocably, the world of pain held color and motion once more._

Warmth builds uncontrollably in Sasuke’s chest...warmth he can’t blame entirely on the bond that flickers to life the moment their eyes meet, but instead something more...something he’d refused to truly feel for years when he was all alone.

Something that reminds him of what it once felt like to be loved.

“What are you doing here?” Sasuke breathes, willing his voice not to shake.

“I’ve been looking for you.” Naruto admits softly.

His expression alone sends Sasuke’s guilt erupting to the surface, making it unbearable to meet the blonde’s gaze outright.

He can feel the bite of Naruto’s worry and desperation radiating through the bond, as well as his consciousness, just as candid and honey-sweet as always.

And somehow, both hurt just the same.

As much as he craves the feeling of Naruto’s warmth when everything else makes him feel cold, everything in his body screams at him to run away. To run away and inevitably hurt him again, like he always does. To keep Naruto from ever truly seeing him. To hide away all the hurt and the weakness, so those eyes --the ones that stare back with familiar blues in the night- never have to look at him like the village people do.

“Well, you found me.” Sasuke finally remarks, his feelings cloaked in neutral disposition as his feet begin to move, brushing past Naruto as he walks away.

Naruto rounds on him, staring at his back incredulously.

“I was worried about you, y’know.” He growls slightly in his frustration, following behind him instantly.

“Don’t. It’s a waste.”

“You’re wrong.” Naruto says quickly. “Besides, I can’t just… stop worrying about you.”

“Why not?” Sasuke’s tone is intentionally cold, indifferent.

“What do you mean _‘why not’?_ ”

Sasuke keeps walking silently, but Naruto stops, frustration simmering down into softness.

“ _You’ve seen into my heart...right Sasuke? You should know._ ” Naruto’s voice echoes devotedly in Sasuke’s mind, words intimate and made just for him to hear.

Sasuke’s eyes widen as he stills, heart beating out of his chest as his face flushes slightly.

It’s quiet for a moment until Naruto speaks again... changing the subject before the meaning of his confession has time to fully set in.

“The dreams are back... aren’t they? That’s why you’re here?”

The wind picks up slightly, brushing blonde locks of Naruto’s hair over his forehead as he looks out to the shimmering waves of blue, sadness evident on his features.

There was no point in denying it.

Even so, Sasuke can’t bring himself to give a verbal acknowledgement --because then that would make it real--so instead he just watches Naruto with tired eyes, studying all his subtle movements, even though he’d memorized them long ago.

“You might be able to convince everyone else, but you can’t hide it from me, Sasuke. You forget… _I know you_.”

“Shut up.” Sasuke warns quietly.

But Naruto persists, a dangerous glint in his eye.

“I know you’re not sleeping because it’s gotten bad again.... I know how empty and out of control you feel right now. I know you’re angry. And I know you don’t want my help… but I won’t leave you alone when you’re like this.”

Naruto looks out to the shore of the lake, memories scattering like light across its surface as the image of Sasuke --so young and withdrawn-- sitting on the dock comes into focus.

Even then, Naruto recognized the pain on his face...the agony in his heart, because it lived within him too.

Naruto blinks fast, the mere memory causing his stomach to twist in sadness.

“I won’t leave you to hurt all alone.” He remarks softly.

Sasuke struggles to swallow down the lump in his throat, a tired sigh escaping him instead.

“You never quit do you... usuratonkachi?”

“Never.” Naruto answers sincerely, the brief hint of a sad smile appearing on his face, his eyes crinkling up at the sides with its warmth.

Sasuke’s pulse races and his face grows abnormally hot. Naruto’s lingering gaze sends chills down his spine, a reaction he generates without even trying.

He hates how exposed and out of control it makes him feel. How everything he feels with Naruto is so intense and unyielding.

He couldn’t blame it entirely on the bond.

It’s always been this way… this unspoken thing between them that didn’t have a name. Sasuke wasn’t sure words could even begin to describe it or if he fully understood it himself.

But even so, he couldn’t ignore the way Naruto’s presence made his heart bound and beat in ways that were so foreign to him. Or the way that feeling filled him with such intense guilt that wasn’t hard to place…

Because deep down Sasuke doesn’t believe he deserves to be happy...not after all he’s done.

He doesn’t deserve Naruto and the way he looks at him with such sadness and understanding even when Sasuke shuts him out over and over again. He doesn’t deserve to live in the warmth of Naruto’s light where he is cold. And he doesn’t deserve to be loved.

Especially by someone like him.

“Quit looking at me like that.” Sasuke mutters, staring at the ground.

“Like what?”

“I don’t know…” Sasuke admits, his words not finding him as easily as he’d like. “like you’re afraid if you take your eyes off me for even one second i’ll disappear.”

“...Will you?” Naruto asks quietly, his tone transparent with unease.

“Will I what?”

“Disappear.”

Sasuke debates it for a silent moment.

“No...”

Naruto frowns, not quite relieved by his words. The thought of Sasuke leaving again sends his stomach in knots and his mind racing, even more restless than the night before.

Because life without Sasuke was like trying to breathe without air.

It was the night sky without the pale blue light of the moon and the spring without its thundershowers. Nothing felt right when they were apart --when Sasuke was lost and spiraling in the dark all alone-- and Naruto would do anything to make sure that would never happen again, no matter how many times he may have to chase him down and do it all over again.

He wouldn’t even hesitate.

Naruto turns and eyes the remains of Sasuke’s childhood home: pillars of splintered wood and cracked stone collapsed in on itself. He wasn’t sure if the damage was from years of unoccupancy or from Pain’s attack on the village, but regardless, he could tell nobody had come here in a long time.

So much pain dwelled within Sasuke because of what had happened here all those years ago… pain that would always be there no matter how much he willed it to disappear… no matter how many nights he cries out in the dark because he doesn’t know what’s real and what’s not.

Naruto hates it. He _hates_ that he can’t make it all go away.

He hates watching Sasuke suffer… feeling him suffer through the bond and being helpless to stop it.

He had spent so many years becoming stronger just to get Sasuke back. And now that he had him, he was still just out of his reach, still withdrawn and haunted by memories of the past.

He’d thought maybe time would help to heal those deep wounds that plagued his heart, but now Naruto wasn’t so sure. Being here...in this place, meant that Sasuke’s condition was progressing worse than he’d originally thought.

He couldn’t just walk away and say nothing like Sasuke wanted. He had to do something, even if it made him angrier than he was already. He had to try.

“Last night … I caught a glimpse of your nightmare.” Naruto admits, drifting closer to the wreckage. He frowns, eyeing the familiar setting with unease. “I wasn’t sure what it was before-- because it was all just images, feelings-- but now… I recognize it. All of it.”

Sasuke curses internally. Naruto was never meant to see any of that, but he couldn’t control his emotions or the bond well enough to block him out in his sleep too.

“Do you really have those terrible dreams every night Sasuke?” His voice cracks slightly. “This whole time?” Naruto asks, a complex expression on his face reading both as guilt and helplessness at the same time.

Sasuke swallows thickly, his mouth suddenly going dry.

“Not every night. Just most nights… when it’s bad.”

“How long?”

“Years.” Sasuke admits, finding himself being strangely honest for a change.

Naruto closes his eyes, Sasuke’s answers clearly affecting him in a way he didn’t anticipate.

“Sakura noticed you’ve stopped going to your sessions. Why is that?”

“That’s none of her business.” Sasuke hisses back.

Naruto blinks back, unsurprised at his hostility.

“She’s just worried about you. We both are… you know that.”

Sasuke stares out at the lake, responding with a slight huff.

“...I want you to come with me to see Granny Tsunade.” Naruto says softly, peering up at the raven-haired boy from under blonde lashes and bangs that hang lower on his face without his hitai-ate. Subtle changes to an otherwise familiar boy with age. “She has to know it’s getting worse so she can help. Maybe she’ll give you something like she did last time to help you sleep. I don’t know. But we have to at least try… Sasuke?”

Sasuke’s gut coils in flames of irritation bordering on anger. Why couldn’t he just give it up? It just made everything so much harder when he looked at him like that… knowing that he’s not only hurting himself but Naruto too. Yet even still, he can’t seem to stop doing it.

“Is that all you came here to say?” Sasuke’s tone is flat, almost annoyed. “If so, I’m leaving.”

“Sasuke… Listen to me.”

“I told you I don’t want your help. I meant it.” He dismisses.

“Running away won’t solve anything Sasuke…” Naruto says with a measured look, fist flexing in a clear tell of irritation. “You should know that by now.”

“Don’t patronize me.”

“I’m not. It’s the truth!”

“That’s rich, coming from you.” Sasuke seethes.

“The fuck is that supposed to mean?” Naruto asks, frustration creeping into his tone along with genuine confusion.

“It means you’re living a lie trying to play house with the villagers.” Sasuke growls, his anger increasing by the second, features tense and tone malicious as he steps towards him. “You can’t honestly be that stupid to believe they’ve changed! That suddenly you’re their hero and they’re no longer afraid of you? It’s all a fucking lie! They only love you now because you’re useful to them!”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about Sasuke…” Naruto hisses defensively, his tone warning him to shut up. Not that Sasuke ever complied anyways...

“ _Tch_. I’m the only one that would. Because they still look at me like they used to look at us... You may have forgotten, but I haven’t.”

Naruto scoffs in disbelief.

“I haven’t forgotten! I would’ve a long time ago if that were possible!” He snaps, his voice faltering as he continues. “But what good will my hatred do? It won’t bring anyone I love back to me... It won’t help me sleep at night. It’s worthless to me. It _doesn’t matter_!”

Blue eyes glare over to the caped man, who’s studying him silently, an unreadable expression on his face. Naruto sighs, trying to calm himself down.

Ah, there he goes, losing his temper again.

Sasuke always had a way of getting him worked up like nobody else. Naruto couldn’t help it… he never could rein in his emotions when it came to him. He knew which buttons to push… all of his weakest points he had the power to exploit if he really wanted to.

That thought should scare him but unsurprisingly it doesn’t. After all, he never thought twice about trusting Sasuke with his heart. He never second guessed his feelings and he knew they wouldn’t change. That was part of what made all of this so hard.

Naruto can’t ignore how intensely he feels… how desperate he is to get Sasuke to let him in... and those emotions just feed to the fire until it grows too powerful to control, consuming them both. But even so, Naruto can’t stop.

“I have people I care about now... people I want to protect. That matters more than the past. That’s why I’m here right now.” He explains, his expression softening as he looks back at Sasuke.

“And what exactly are you trying to protect me from?”

Naruto’s tone is even-- serious-- as he remembers the panic and terror he felt in Sasuke’s mind the night before.

“Yourself.”

Sasuke scoffs dismissively, face blanched in a familiar expression of indifference.

“Now you’re really starting to piss me off.”

“Ah, that’s fine.” Naruto remarks, harsher than he’d meant. “I’d rather you be angry and alive than dead. Or wasting away in some hospital bed like last time.”

Sasuke stiffens at that, and Naruto regrets saying it immediately.

“I don’t want that.” Naruto clarifies, closing his eyes sadly. “I don’t want you to hurt… ever, Sasuke. So let me help you. Please.” He pleads, taking a step closer to him, hand outstretched for him to take.

Sasuke’s eyes follow the movement, watching him like a skittish stray cat debating its next move. His gaze lingers on the marking etched in the middle of Naruto’s calloused palm… a striking juxtaposition of the crescent that adorned his own.

He doesn’t have to imagine what Naruto’s hands would feel like.

He knows their warmth from years of fleeting touches that trace lingering fire over his skin… as well as the more violent ones, (which were more common in occurrence) that left him frustrated beyond measure at his own inability to kill the only thing standing between him and true darkness.

Sasuke’s fingers twitch at his side, longing for that familiar burn where he is cold. For even the simplest forms of physical contact he had denied himself of for so long that he finds himself craving. Affection. Trust. Intimacy. Love.

All things he does not deserve to know...

Sasuke’s presence in Naruto’s life had caused him nothing but heartache after all these years. It was selfish of him to even want them in the first place, wasn’t it? Selfish and naive to believe he was deserving of his kindness.

He doesn’t realize his hand unconsciously reaching out for Naruto until he pulls it back, cursing himself internally.

He could bear to live without those pure, unadulterated desires. He had to.

After all, Sasuke was no stranger to longing for what he could never have.

“No.” He says firmly, though his voice is much quieter than before. “I won’t be your burden to carry. Not anymore Naruto. It’s _not right_.”

“You’re not a burden to me!” He protests fiercely, fingers curling in the material covering Sasuke’s bicep in his Anbu uniform.

“Let me go.”

He does, instantly, as if Sasuke had burnt him.

“ _Let me go_.” Sasuke repeats, this time his meaning shifting to something more pointed, something that filled Naruto’s body with ice cold dread and stung his eyes.

Something that sounded suspiciously like goodbye.

Naruto mouth gapes in outrage as Sasuke swiftly walks away from him for the second time today, heading back to the deserted street he came from, where he tries desperately to ignore the invisible red that stains his shoes with each step and the burning ache in his chest.

Naruto’s outstretched hand begins to shake in anger, rage filling him with each passing second.

Not again. He wasn’t going to lose him again.

“You stubborn reckless _bastard_!” He snaps sharply. “Come back here. Sasuke!”

Sasuke doesn’t turn, expression completely unfazed. His swift gait doesn’t falter at all, cape swaying in the wind that’s picked up ever so slightly.

Naruto stalks after him, all logic or reason far away from him now.

Sasuke glances over his caped shoulder to glare at him as he gets closer, partly unsurprised in his following.

“How long do you think you can ignore what he did to you before it eats you alive, Sasuke? Huh? Look at you! You look like you haven’t slept in a week. And I know you’ve been drinking again... I could smell it all over you the second I found you.” Naruto’s gravelly voice trembles with the weight of his desperation. “How much longer until I lose you all over again?!”

Sasuke whips around, roughly yanking the collar of Naruto’s shirt forward.

“Shut up. Shut _up_!” He yells, overwhelmed by his words.

Naruto stares unflinchingly back into his eyes, deep familiar blues meeting lavender, red and swirling black.

He can feel Sasuke’s shaky breath on his face they’re so close. He can see the conflicting emotions play out in front of his eyes: anger, guilt, sadness, immeasurable affection... His gaze flickers from Naruto’s eyes to his lips and back again before realizing what he was doing.

Naruto doesn’t have much time to contemplate what that meant before he’s thrown backwards, the impact with the ground knocking the air from his lungs. He struggles to sit up but Sasuke’s on top of him in a second, straddling his lap, and shoving him roughly back into the dirt by his collar.

Naruto steadily grips Sasuke’s forearms, but doesn’t resist.

“I don’t care that you’re angry with me right now. I don’t care that you don’t want me.” Naruto seethes, his raspy tone melting into such profound sadness that Sasuke can feel the ache in his own bones. Naruto’s hands grip his forearms tighter. “I won’t let you die. I won’t let you throw your life away as if it was nothing! As if none of this meant anything!”

Sasuke stares down at him in shock, shock which quickly morphs back into anger as his fist winds back in a trance-like motion.

Images of their final battle flicker through Sasuke’s head, both of them bloodied and bruised as Sasuke straddled him in the valley just like this, punching him over and over and over again, until both Naruto’s face and his knuckles turned purple. Just the thought of it made him feel sick with guilt.

Sasuke breathes shakily, his expression twisted in rage faltering as soon as he realizes what he’s doing.

Naruto stares up at him, body lax against the ground. He could easily fight back if he wanted to, matching him in strength as they’ve done countless times before… but he doesn’t. His blonde hair has fallen back from his forehead, and he’s surprisingly calm --gaze soft and unafraid-- underneath him.

Sasuke blinks back in confusion.

In a moment of decisiveness, Naruto’s hands reach up to touch the back of Sasuke’s neck, pulling him downwards.

Sasuke sucks in a breath, preparing for the impact of a headbutt he anticipated would come. But instead…

Instead, all Sasuke can feel is the soft warmth of Naruto’s forehead pressing against his, and the calming sensation of calloused fingertips lazily combing through the dark hair on the nape of his neck, like his mother used to do when he was young.

Sasuke gasps quietly, eyes wide and unguarded. He pulls away only slightly.

“What are you doing?”

“Not fighting you.” Naruto says with a soft smile that crinkles the sides of his eyes, running his warm fingertips down Sasuke’s neck. “I don’t want to do that anymore. So don’t fight me.”

And in his shock, almost melting into putty under the blonde’s touch, Sasuke’s walls come tumbling down before he even has time to reign his emotions in.

Naruto’s honeysweet consciousness flows through him effortlessly, pumping through his veins like liquid dopamine and fluttering in his chest in ways he hadn’t allowed himself to feel in a long time. The feeling is grounding… magnetic, like two converse objects in orbit of one another finally finding their rhythm once more.

Sasuke can’t understand it. He can’t understand how someone like Naruto can look at him like that. With no traces of malice or hatred after all he’s done...no fear. After all this time, his heart was unwavering, his disposition clear. He had a feeling that would never change.

Sasuke shakes his head slightly, an impossibly heavy look in his eyes as they begin to sting.

“Why...” He chokes out, more to himself than anyone else.

Naruto frowns slightly, cocking his head to the side.

“Why aren’t you angry? Why don’t you hate me?” Sasuke’s voice cracks uncharacteristically, his mind at war with itself... desperate for relief in the form of whatever answer Naruto could give him.

“ _You should hate me._ ” Sasuke’s words echo through the bond in his mind. Naruto sucks in a quiet breath.

All he can hear is the hurt… profound hurt that grips Sasuke down to his bones. Hurt that refuses to let go.

Naruto shakes his head with a smile tinged in sadness.

“Hate you?” He echoes, as if he had never even considered the thought.

Sasuke just blinks back, unresisting when Naruto pulls him closer, grazing the bridge of his nose with his own tenderly, breathing in his scent.

“I could never hate you, Sasuke. Never.”

Sasuke was afraid he’d say that, melting under his touch as if it was instinctual for him.

Naruto pulls back to look at him, and Sasuke finds himself transfixed on captivating blues… the ones that ward his nightmares away and pull him back to the earth when he feels lost.

Blues that accompany warm calloused fingertips and effortless laughter at inappropriate times and old memories of summer days where he allowed himself to be a boy again and the sound of a heartbeat too persistent to die out and leave him all alone and everything else that Naruto is to him.

Sasuke averts his eyes, his face heating up under the blonde’s affectionate staring.

“You still don’t get it do you? After all this time?” Naruto says with a gentle laugh that would’ve made his knees buckle if they weren’t pressed into the dirt at the moment.

“You’re it for me, Sasuke.” Naruto says with absolute sincerity. “I’ll never want anything more than I want you.”

And he means it. Sasuke knows he does.

It’s quiet for a moment before Naruto speaks again, blue eyes flitting from Sasuke’s eyes to his lips nervously. Sasuke just stares in shock, heart beating loudly in his chest.

“Can I kiss you?” He asks.

Sasuke blushes furiously, words caught in his throat. He gives an enthusiastic nod, ignoring the voices in his head telling him he doesn’t deserve this, that he doesn’t deserve him.

And then, Naruto kisses him… tender and chaste and with much more ease than the two they’d shared in the past and suddenly he can’t think of anything else. His lips are soft and taste faintly of miso and most importantly, they’re Naruto’s.

It takes Sasuke a second to reciprocate in his shock, but when he does… he melts into the kiss, slotting their mouths together with unrepressed fervor.

Sasuke had spent years wondering what it would feel like for Naruto to kiss him and mean it.

But somehow even his most vivid daydreams could never compare to this. Nothing could ever compare to the real thing… not his warmth or the way he cards his fingers through his hair as their lips crash softly over and over or the way he feels like the closest thing to home Sasuke’s felt in a long, long time.

Sasuke runs his thumb over Naruto’s cheekbone, trailing his fingers over the scars that adorn his cheeks tenderly.

He feels so at ease like this. As if the demons that haunt him can’t reach him here, silenced temporarily by the warmth of Naruto’s rough fingertips and the frantic beating of his own heart.

“You…” Sasuke says between kisses.

“Mm?”

Naruto breaks away for air, enjoying the way Sasuke flushes red and pants slightly as he sits back on him. He gently pulls Naruto’s hand out of his now messy hair, pressing a lingering kiss to his palm.

“You’re the same to me...” He mumbles against the warm skin, fluttering dark eyelashes flitting upwards to reveal piercing black and lavender.

“ _My one and only._ ” Sasuke’s words echo devotedly through the bond, in a tone of voice reserved for Naruto alone.

Not just a statement, but a vow.

Naruto lets out a breath he didn’t know he’d been keeping in, eyes wide and mouth slack in the shock of Sasuke’s admission.

And there it is… that rare amused smile that Naruto had missed for so long. Not the grimace of a powerful enemy he’d faced many times before, but instead one of benevolent warmth that made his breath hitch in his throat.

“It’s strange seeing you speechless.” Sasuke muses.

Naruto laughs lightly.

“I can’t help it. I’d missed y-” The words die on his tongue as he glances past Sasuke’s face to the figure circling overhead.

“What is it?” Sasuke asks, instantly tense. His eyes narrow, following Naruto’s line of vision when he hears its familiar call.

A daunting feeling overtakes him as he watches the hawk flying high against the darkening sky. He didn’t have to announce what that meant. Naruto knew.

Yet he says it anyway, as though he couldn’t believe it himself.

“Mission.” He swallows dryly.

Naruto nods understandingly, concern etched all over his face.

He wanted to stop him, to tell him he was in no condition to leave right now, to beg him to stay, but the words wouldn’t come out.

Truthfully, he knew it wouldn’t change a thing.

Sasuke would go regardless. It was no use making him angry before leaving for a --likely dangerous-- black ops mission.

They’d visit Tsunade when he gets back. Sasuke would be fine. He had to convince himself of that, as much as his body filled with fear at the thought of any other scenario.

Sasuke rises to his feet easily, brushing the dust off his clothes.

He offers Naruto a hand, which he takes. Once he’s standing, Sasuke hesitates with a frown, not wanting to let go.

He runs his thumb over Naruto’s knuckles, seemingly distracted by his own thoughts.

“Sasuke?” Naruto asks softly, trying and failing to conceal his unease.

He drops the hand, his expression placid and unreadable once more before he turns away.

“Hm?”

“Come back to me, alright?”

Sasuke glances back over his shoulder at him, framed by the pinks and oranges of a setting sun in the sky.

“I will.” He promises.

And not even a moment later he’s gone, silently leaping between the rooftops of buildings toward the setting sun and whatever threat was waiting for him at nightfall... the ghost of Naruto’s warmth ever-present on his skin.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've returned from the dead! thank you all so much for your kind comments and kudos, especially the last couple months I've not been updating. I really appreciate it and I'm very sorry for the late update. :( To be completely candid, my mental health had taken a turn for the worse for a while there, and I've had to learn how to take care of myself these past months, starting therapy and medication and trying to find a new "normal". Currently I'm feeling much better and have been writing a lot more lately (yay!). hope y'all liked this chapter, I'll try to get the next one out as soon as I can! tysm for reading <3  
> my twitter is @kohoeha


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